


in the letters of blood and fire

by TheQueenInTheNorth



Series: lou does the kink bingo 2020 [17]
Category: Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. (TV)
Genre: Childhood Trauma, F/M, Implied/Referenced Child Abuse, Implied/Referenced Rape/Non-con, Murder, Torture, kasius is a supportive boyfriend who should /also/ get therapy, sinara needs therapy. what she has is torturing people who wronged her, who needs therapy when you can just torture people who wronged you
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-03-18
Updated: 2020-03-18
Packaged: 2021-02-28 22:02:14
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,603
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23204383
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/TheQueenInTheNorth/pseuds/TheQueenInTheNorth
Summary: Sinara has been at the mercy of too many people through her life, not one inclined to show her mercy. But now the tables have turned - and she has no taste for mercy, either.
Relationships: Kasius/Sinara (Marvel)
Series: lou does the kink bingo 2020 [17]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1591909
Comments: 4
Kudos: 8
Collections: MCU Kink Bingo Round 4





	in the letters of blood and fire

**Author's Note:**

> the square was 'knifeplay' and somehow that turned into 'murder those who exploit the defenseless' and now we just live with that ig

Sinara weighed the knife in her hand, looking to Kasius for reassurance that this was not crossing any lines.

It wasn’t for her. It was justified. Retribution. But she had gotten so used to, so comfortable with Kasius looking at her with such adoration, she didn’t think she could take it if he ever stopped.

Instead he nodded and put his hand over hers on the hilt of the dagger, pressing it down, slicing through clothes and then through skin. Not a deep cut but drawing a thin line of blood.

“Do you know who I am?”Sinara asked.

He probably didn’t. None of the others had. Which was alright. It wasn’t about her so much as about them. They hadn’t changed. They deserved this for a dozen, a hundred, a thousand different lives destroyed. Hers was just the one that had ended with someone in a position to do something about it.

His eyes were wide and terrified and confused, darting from her to Kasius to the knife on his chest.

Maybe he knew who she was, or guessed from Kasius’ presence. Recognising the heir to the throne made it easy to figure she must be the soldier who’d eradicated Ponarian’s forces when the man had betrayed and slaughtered Prince Faulnak. The one who’d been named viscountess for her service. The one who’d be queen consort some day.

It would not make sense to him, of course, why two royals would seek him out on this rundown planet and carve patterns into his flesh.

“Do you know who I was?”Sinara asked.

He shook his head, screamed as the dagger cut deeper, and gasped,“Please. Please stop.”

She wouldn’t for quite some time. That was his own fault.

His death at her hand had, unbeknownst to either of them, been decided decades ago, when he had laughed in her mother’s face as she’d begged for another week to scrounge up enough to pay their rent in the aftermath of the mine collapse. When his refusal had made her parents desperate enough to take the recruiter’s coin and hand him their eldest.

That it would be a slow death had been decided by him, too, when they’d found him earlier. The girl in his bed could be mistaken for a woman only at a casual glance. The stony expression on her face was one Sinara had seen on many young faces when she’d played across from his house as a child. He’d accepted late payment under certain circumstances then, as he still did now. Her mother had been too old for his tastes.

Sinara had been given to the army instead.

“We weren’t here,”Kasius had told the girl and pressed all coins he had into her shaking hands.“You won’t have to come back, either.”

Even if she told, it wouldn’t matter. No one would cry for this piece of scum. No one would be able to come for them even if they did.

“She asked you a question,”Kasius said.

Ver-Rhen shook his head. Tears were streaming down his face.

Sinara sank the dagger into his belly and twisted it up under his ribs. It was a practiced move by now, as easy as slicing bread. She’d cried and thrown up the first time she’d been made to do it. Commandant Sarelle had beaten her for it and locked her up without food for five days, for wasting the ration she’d heaved back out. She’d never punished the highborn recruits that way. She’d still been doing it to the lowerborn ones when they’d found her a few weeks ago. That was over with. Sinara wondered if she’d learned her lesson in that little windowless room. Not that it would have been a lesson to put to much use. Even if she’d stooped to eating her fingers - and she’d suggested just that to Sinara, ten years old and begging to be let out - she’d have starved by now. It would’ve been bad. Sarelle had spent her life well fed. Sinara had known how to go hungry. It had been the lack of light that had made her beg.

It was the pain that made Ver-Rhen beg. Sinara twisted the dagger.“I asked you a question.”

“Sinara,”he choked out.“You’re Sinara.”

“But you don’t know which one.” She pulled the dagger free and let the tip of it graze the hollow of his throat.“There’s too many of us, isn’t there? Just like there’s too many families whose misery you profited off. Did you know you couldn’t evict us the way you wanted to?” She nicked his skin, drew a line down to the side of his ribcage.“Of course you knew. You just also knew we couldn’t fight back, didn’t you?”

She thrust the blade between two ribs. She waited for the howl of pain to fade into whimpers before continuing.“I don’t just share a name with the Good Queen, you know. I share her thoughts on social responsibilities, too. I do not share her distaste for corporal punishment. Not for lowlives like you.” She wanted to twist the dagger again. She didn’t want to risk giving him the relief of passing out. She dug a single, gloved finger into the wound on his stomach.“You knew we couldn’t fight for our rights. Couldn’t hope to fight back against you.” She hit him across the face when his eyes rolled back into his head.“Look at me. How does it feel? Not being able to fight back?”

His blood stained her glove. There was much more blood on his greedy hands.

“Did you know,”Kasius said, picking over the utensils in his briefcase,“that there’s a phrase in this one dead Terran language that sounds rather like his name?” He chose a syringe, tapping against the side to make sure there was no trapped air.“ _Sich wehren_. It means _to fight back._ ” He rammed the syringe into Ver-Rhen’s neck.“That’ll keep you conscious. So go ahead. Try. Wehr dich.”

Sinara laughed. If it came out a tad hysterical, so be it.

“Wehr dich,”she repeated. The syllables were foreign on her tongue but she liked the sound of them.“You’re going to die. It’s going to hurt real bad, too. Go on, wehr dich, die with a little dignity.” She picked a new spot. The army had taught her between which ribs blades went to kill and between which for information. She could make this last however long she pleased.“You deserve to suffer, you know. For all the people you’ve made suffer with your greed. Wehr dich.” The blood gushed over her fingers, warm even through the gloves.“You’re scum.” He was whimpering loud enough she had to raise her voice.“Wehr dich. I’ll carve you into as many piece as you carved my life into. Go on. Wehr dich.”

He couldn’t, not really, but that was the point, wasn’t it?

_You’ll die slow. Wehr dich. This was a long time coming. Wehr dich. The world is better without you in it. Wehr dich._

“You know,”Kasius said, much later, when Ver-Rhen was slowly suffocating on his own blood and they were on their way to their ship, his arm around her waist holding her steady rather more than she’d willingly admit,“We could see if your family still lives here.”

She leaned on him a little more.“I want to finish the list, first.”

He didn’t push the matter. They’d made good headway. His father’s name wasn’t too far away, now, and with that some true systemic change.

“Alright,”he said instead.

He’d gotten them off the planet by the time she’d showered off the bits of Ver-Rhen still stuck to her; he set the autopilot and held his hand out to her.

She settled in his lap and buried her face against the crook of his neck. She was exhausted but it was the sort of exhaustion that came with a day well spent, a job well done.

His fingers were brushing through her hair soothingly and she started to drift off as he traced the outline of the flower tattooed onto the back of her neck, nearly at her hairline.

He’d carefully coloured it in for her, hiding the scar from when she and Aza had scraped the brandings off with stolen kitchen knives.

Lund-Ek had always said it was too much trouble to tell those with no family name to speak of apart, it would be easier if their ID numbers were permanently branded onto them. He’d always used their own tags to do it, heating them with a lighter and not listening to the protests that they already wore the numbers before pressing the metal into soft skin.

It had been a slow process, killing him. More skin than she had thought could be ripped off with the hot metal before a body gave out. Kasius had to take over in between, when her fingers had started blistering.

“Almost done,”she mumbled.

“Almost,”Kasius echoed.

She snuggled closer.“Tell me that thing about inviolable dignity again.”

It had been baffling to learn that she’d had rights that had been infringed on. She’d always just assumed she hadn’t had any in the first place.

But hearing them was good. It made having them more real.

It made going after those who’d taken them feel even more justified than just a vague sense of how none of it should have happened to a child.

And falling asleep to Kasius’ soft voice and his fingers drawing patterns down her back was one of her favourite things, anyway.


End file.
